Key Functions
Learning for the 21st Century - Part 4: Section 7 - Point 1
7.1 If lifelong learning for all is progressively to become a
reality and the culture of the country changed, action will be
required on many fronts. In particular, attention will have to
be paid to the following key functions.
- Volume - securing a large and systematic expansion
in the number of people who are, and regard themselves as being,
lifelong learners and increasing the number of organisations aiming
to become learning organisations. In short, there is a need to
achieve a vast increase in both engagement and demand.
- Social composition - ensuring far wider participation
by those social groups currently under-represented in all forms
and locales of learning, based upon the principles of equity and
inclusion.
- Mode - recognising the validity, without penalty, of
an enlarged range of modes of study, whether part-time or full-time,
residential or non-residential and by many different modes throughout
life;
- Method - encouraging a variety of forms of learning
characterised by flexibility, including distance and open learning,
through modules, by using the new communications and information
technology, in the home, in the community or at work.
- Ownership - stimulating greater ownership and control
over the development of their learning by individuals, families,
groups and communities.
- Achievement - enabling the achievements of learners
to be properly recognised and recorded in ways which mark progress,
attest to standards, facilitate progression and mobility and serve
as an encouragement to further learning.
- Quality - establishing common approaches to the establishment
and maintenance of quality, based upon an agreed framework for
self-assessment, validation, audit and review.
- Dissemination - making sure that all forms and methods
of the dissemination and application of knowledge are recognised
and equitably rewarded, whether through excellence in teaching,
in the preparation of learning materials, through development
activities or research.
- Funding - paying attention to the overall volume of
funding provided for learning and its promotion and delivery,
as well as to the proper balance of funding between levels and,
within funding regimes, between the needs of different learners
and programmes of learning.